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I heard this from a colleague who works at an NBC Gray affiliate. It's not an NBC thing. It's a "Gray" thing. Eventually all stations will be removing their affliliation from their logos. The reasoning is to distance the stations from the affiliates and to separate itself from the fake news movement that the national media gets. Basically it's so people trust the LOCAL news and to take on their own branding and identity.

All I can say is, If a job insists on paying people near minimum wage, stop asking them for experience or a degree. We have a major issue in this country with employers demanding ready-made employees, ripe with experience or education, yet no salary to back it up.

I would also say teachers don’t deserve to be begging for, or dipping into their own limited pay for, basic classroom supplies. They also shouldn’t be working in (in far too many cases) unhealthy and outright dangerous conditions. They shouldn’t be held to impossible standards and being told to do more with ever-fewer resources. And yet here we are. The intent isn’t about magnanimity, it’s putting things into the larger societal framework. There are a whole lot of people in a whole lot of jobs who could fairly be called massively underpaid. And these groups will sometimes commiserate with each other, but also turn on each other. Take teachers - when a strike happens, particularly in working-class/blue-collar type areas, communities often split into factions of “they deserve more than they’re getting” and “they’re overpaid; they only work 9 months; they’re grooming kids” and related vitriol. “Let them try to do my job” (whatever that is) “and see how they like it.” It can get really ugly. When newspaper journalists go on strike…wait, do those still exist? Anyway, there’s a lot of the public that respects what they do and understands they get paid crap wages. Lots of us get paid crap wages. But there’s also a huge part of the population that sees it as no loss that there’s less journalists at work. They’re all just liberal mouthpieces or some such thing. They’re hacks. They’re whatever. Empathy and sympathy are in short supply for industry upon industry. It’s sad, but it’s reality. I don’t know that a deeper societal change is possible, but I feel safe in predicting one-off skirmishes are generally not going to move the needle all that much. A little symbolic win here and there, sure. But not without trade-offs, and sometimes losses that counter the gains. I’m old enough to say my generation isn’t going to be around to see a structural shift. I hope the upcoming generations make progress, and find ways to move from less successful battles that pit groups against each other to more productive changes that benefit everyone.

Your're right the appetite is there for serialized drama, and the reality shows have become the new serialized drama. You have a house or different events as the set. You have the drama. Maybe FOX would have a type of reality show as the new daytime drama. Plus game shows was once a hot commodity as well too. The audience is going to hate to see news on daily. Give em something different than news. When your local news comes on at 3pm/4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11pm. The audience is going to feel burned out and will turn you off. There some strong points you made here and there. With the last (2) Proctor Gamble shows they were looking at changing the model from 5 days a week. There was some buzz about that . PG wanted out the soap business and they did in 2009/10. Yes, it cost $50 million dollars a year to produce a serialized drama, because in 2008 YR licensing fees were up and many elder cast had to take paycuts. There were some actors who were cut too, because of CBS slashing the licensing fees. Being #1 comes with alot of baggage too. You say that the sets are cheap maybe in the 70s, but the shows creator was very instrumental in the show being lush. In the 80s they would have real champagne, fresh flowers and they have a huge production values. Many crew members talks about how they use certain lighting and they have been lauded over the shows production values. All My Children, ABC thought moving the show to Los Angeles the show would come under budget, but it was over budget. While One Life was the read-headed step-child that was always come under budget. (Depending on who you asked many would say One Life should of been the one to move to LA) General Hospital is and always been ABC's crown jewel. Guiding Light was moved out of their NYC CBS studio to New Jersey, to try a new model with outdoor filming. The executive producer at the time was trying to save the show. Soap producers live in a bubble, and when budgets have been cut they make do with what they have. Soaps at one time was a cash cow for networks and the money was so big during the 70s up to the 90s. The money the soaps made for the network help fund many primetime pilots/shows. Nobody had a crystal ball to see how television/ technology+the internet would change the way people watched their shows, news, sports etc. Yes, at the end of the day it does come down to economics. NBC/Corday Productions/Sony had a deal on their last cycle that Days would transition from NBC broadcast to NBC streaming Peacock. Days has become very popular on Peacock and has been renewed til 2025 which would make it to the shows 60th year. Seeing YR/Bold probably having a (2 year pick-up and that my opinion) The last cycle was a 4 year pick-up, and probably Sony & (The Bells- the children own Bold outright.) would probably move the show to Paramount Plus. Again, I'm speculating, because YR has a bigger budget than Days and the model that Sony has now with YR. Where the current head-writer is also/ the breakdown writer /and EP. Sony wanted that same model for Days, and the folks at Days pushed back on that. Sometime next year YR /Bold going to have to make some cuts for CBS to pay for those licensing fees. ABC owns General Hospital outright and with Bob Iger trying to find out what he wants Disney to do with ABC. I can see General Hospital moving over to hulu full-time. (as Jamey Giddens once said on daytimeconfidental.com podcast a decade and half ago that YR & General Hospital would be the last two standing.) If they both can make it 2025-2026. What a feat that would be..

Given that Fox has historically had more rigid branding conventions than the other major networks (the only ones to deviate from using network-centric branding including WSVN, KHON, WDRB and KVRR), I think culling network references from Gray’s Fox affiliates would be much harder to implement. ABC has apparently been requiring affiliates to include the “circle” logo into their station logos, making it also unclear whether they can pull network branding.

While I would interested to see what CBS might come up with, I think it would be a shot in the foot for them. All of their weekday newscasts get third/last-place in viewers, odds are this wouldn't be any different. The only way for it to work is if they were to have it run right after the morning game show block, which is where I think they could get the most viewers who just did not change the channel (I am in my tweenties, and whenever i was sick I'd watch the game shows), plus they'd have have to figure out which talent to use to anchor it, but I'll leave that for another post. Also, at this point should this thread be renamed to something like "Midday Network News"

No switch to GrayONE yet, but WMTV got the new brand (15 News) and new music (Unite from Stephen Arnold Music) on Wednesday.

I see shows like Daily as programming that can assist in extending the lifespan of broadcast TV and local stations by at least another couple decades. If Daily/GMA3/whatever CBS launches to replace Y&R/Bold can make enough ad dollars to keep them from selling off their broadcast networks to a company like Sinclair Broadcast Group or Byron Allen Media(I have no beef with them owning a broadcast network, but many do) then that is a win for viewers. Afternoon news programming can also be viewed as a statement against disinformation. Daytime as a whole lost a lot of viewers due to OJ, cable and streaming, but the big dropoff happened thanks to social media playing a huge role. Many get their soap operas(thanks to cooked up drama from reality TV/celebrities, whatever your neighbors are doing, political arguments with your Facebook Friends), your sports highlights, and their news from social media. Programs like Daily you could say provide people with headlines vs. hyperbole, facts vs. “what I heard,” and makes the audience watching more curious to actually do their research. As more people cut the cord or have their high speed internet data capped, programs like Daily(aiding local news) will be helpful in providing basic headlines. Afternoon News isn’t a fad that’s going away… NBC, by happy accident, went from being the laughing stock of daytime afternoons to becoming thought leaders. There’s no way CBS, Nexstar CW, and even ABC isn’t looking at what they’re doing to see how they can replicate it. Also wanted to mention that I’m on PTO this week and was curious about what sort of ads aired during Daily so I watched my local station’s feed… not once did I see a national ad for life insurance for 65+, As Seen on TV appliances/cookware, or an injury lawsuit CTA. It was 85-90% prescription drug ads(including Ozempic, a drug they’ve not always covered positively) and the rest consumer goods. Compare that to the ads you’ll see on YR/Bold/GH. Clearly Daily is more successful than some are willing to admit.

Hiring Oscar-winning writers isn’t going to change the trajectory of soaps. They are a relic of a bygone era with a few left chugging along, closer to the end than the beginning. Throwing money you don’t have at a dying genre isn’t going to change it. So great, squeeze what you can out of it and look toward the future, not the past. Audiences aren’t the same and aren’t going to want the same things. Splitting the soaps down on the broadcast schedule to alternating days is pointless beyond getting a portion of the schedule open for something else. Daytime is a 5x a week pattern for good reason—it’s the most common way we live our lives. Of course there are exceptions to this, but by and large we go to school and work during the same times (primarily daytime) weekdays. A soap twice a week simply makes no business sense; daytime doesn’t follow the prime time approach (although CBS has been turning prime time this fall into a good approximation of daytime with so many Price is Right and Let’s Make a Deal specials ). Viewers aren’t going to burn out if you offer more news because they’re not watching all of it. That just isn’t a thing that people are tuned to one channel from 4 am to midnight, actively engaged and suddenly experiencing news fatigue because the station added a newscast. They watch bits and pieces that fit their schedules. There seems to be a fascination with counting the number of hours in forums like this, but your average viewer is not doing that. (And if people totally burned out on news available much of the day, someone better warn Ted Turner back in the 1980s .) NND fits better in today’s reality than Days. Sorry old-schoolers, it just does. It’s more economical, it connects to the brand and it’s helping some affiliates. And while ABC rides GH into its inevitable sunset, GMA3 is a better fit than if they’d kept another dying soap. Heck, it fits better than the Chew. That was a perfectly fine effort that had a nice solid run. But this is strategically better. CBS is a bit different in that their morning show has never had the success of a Today or GMA. It’s harder to build a base there for an afternoon news hour, though certainly not impossible. Just a heavier lift with results that would need to be viewed in that context IF they ever went that way. Not saying they will. They managed to get new life out of Price is Right, and have a decent enough counterpart in Let’s Make a Deal, so what comes next in a post-soap world will be interesting to see.

This is confirmation enough for everyone. We don't need a station-by-station report on a peacock removal. From here on, said posts will be hidden. Let us know if a station hasn't changed, at all.

Facts aren't blame, really. Some things just are. And there isn't always a unicorn out there, "if only" someone spent more or wrote better or whatever. People were leaving soaps for long time. Then gas tanks almost empty there; throwing more money at a dying genre is pointless. Its not blame to say key audiences in 2023 aren't the same as in 1983. It's also overly broad to just label all news division programming with one brush. It struck me on a recent NY visit to the NBC store the distinct merchandise for the third and fourth hours of Today. There is, of course, the main show umbrella, but the other hours are treated as somewhat unique entities. The content isn't identical, and that is typically true at the local level as well. There's a whole thread here somewhere about how the 10 am hour on WABC is noticeably different from the other newscasts, and even among more traditional newscasts, tonality varies. If there was some magic formula for success and a profitable bottom line, someone would be trying it. Millions upon millions of dollars overall are at stake, people's jobs are at stake. No one is just sitting around ordering up another hour from the news division on a whim or so they can get out the door in time to make it to happy hour. You have a population segment that gravitates toward the likes of Maury and Springer. Some that like the Kelly and Mark or Kelly Clarkson type shows. Some who can't get enough court shows. And then there are a bajillion streaming options, sports galore, cable channels with movies out the wazoo, dramas, sitcoms, etc. That pie has been sliced six ways from Sunday. It's easy to say "do something different." It's much harder to actually find that "something" that delivers the profits it needs to. This is really interesting. Cutting back from 5 days is one thing, but that is a guarantee you're off the broadcast network. You're not getting a three-day a week slot (or whatever) there. But to the point of less characters and sets...from what I saw of those days seeing Y&R, there were very few characters. Generally the same old actors from before and a few seemingly disposable new ones--generally offspring or other relatives--and that's it. Two or three people to a storyline being told that day, and maybe 2 or 3 storylines being covered max. Even then, the characters seemed to them mix and match among scenes, so you really weren't getting more actors, they just shuffled among the sets and fellow castmates in some kind of weird, soapy square dance. Also didn't count many sets. At least a half dozen over that span looked pretty much like they did years ago. I'm assuming they got some fresh paint here and there. The others looked like SNL skit sets--in that they could easily be repurposed with minimal effort to become something else generic for limited use. Of course, casts and crew cost money, so I am not literal when I say this, but I have to wonder where the money is going. It isn't into the product. And I know the soaps were never high production value. They were cheesier than cheesy. Always. But it looks like they're down to fumes, and that makes sense. Tastes change.

That reminds me of something on WBAY a couple years ago where there was an ad for a home medical provider showing their building and ten seconds later coming out of that break... 'Breaking news from Allouez, where a car has driven into a building'...and they cut to that same home medical building, now with a car halfway through its front window (thankfully nobody hurt there). Gotta love it when the sponsor somehow gets 'lucky' with another mention without the ad department getting involved.

Mayim Bialik is out on syndicated J!

WBRC doesn't emphasize their Fox affiliation much in their current logo - it is at a secondary line.

EDIT: Agree to disgree. I'd like to think of this as ideaological back and forth rather than spamming. To it's credit, News Daily much like NBC News Now is a straightforward newscast. Something MSNBC and the rest of cable news could use more of. It's just one of too many newscasts. As a longtime soap watcher my self I can see why networks would have to cancel them. Ratings are low, they're expensive, the demos are old, they've been in a crap quality production and writing state for years. They aren't exmept from a lack of creativity, you are totally right that they're running on auto pilot. Watching B&B you'd almost think the writers were deliberately trying to get the soap axed. Ideally we could salvage them though a number of methods but that is unlikely. The crux of my ranting is...if or WHEN soaps do get cancelled, can you find something, anything, other than another newscast (or infomercials) to replace them. I say this as someone working in news, watching the trajectory of the industry turn journalism into time filler, not just as a disgruntled viewer that's "bashing news". But alas we are all free to watch whatever we want on streaming---to the detriment of linear TV, and myself a linear tv employee.

With the runaway costs of programming, much of the blame lies with the content providers (station owners).

Sidebar: Given the cheap quality of both their products —as well as Sinclair's media bias — these companies need to be nowhere near owning a broadcast network.

It’s underwhelming. Basically they redid the floors, replaced the desk, hid the weather center with a monitor wall, and added a monitor wall on the back wall? Am I missing anything? I understand there’s only so much you can do at times but their set IMO was fine as is. I wonder if this was an update done by the station with money the had or the O&O office had them freshen it up.

Fairly well-known. He was never quite "official" in the role, but served as weekend forecaster for the better part of a year, after Jim Ramsey's exit for DC, and before Andy Avalos was hired.

By and large, it is a nice improvement over the previous news set, which had outdated TV monitors (my 60-inch TV at home looks more modern than the screens from their old set ) in their now defunct Weather Center and the front-facing one on the news desk, as well.

Hope I haven't veered too far from NN Daily. *Network executives keep soely pointing to (rather saying blame) shifts in viewing habits without recognizing bad writing plays a role. If you look at the trend of when viewers started leaving soaps--the mid 90s--that's when alot of bad writing trends began, in addition to the OJ trial, shifting viewing habits, etc. "If there was some magic formula for success and a profitable bottom line, someone would be trying it. Millions upon millions of dollars overall are at stake, people's jobs are at stake. No one is just sitting around ordering up another hour from the news division on a whim or so they can get out the door in time to make it to happy hour." --- I would like to belive that, but it's clear, whatever sells milk it. We see it in the movies with heavily recycled franchises and now we see it on tv with news. Not to stray too off topic but As for soaps, they don't have to be five days weekly. They've locked themselves into that model. As we can see having one hour scripted content five days a week with no summer break is an expensive model that is collapsing. If they did Y&R Mon to Wed and one hour B&B Thu/Fri *might* work. You are absolutely right, tastes do change, but the appetite for serialized drama is still there as we see with streaming. Y&R just got a ratings bump from bringing back old characters, showing that there is still an interest (the demo is a different story). All in all, the worse programing gets, the remaining viewers will also turn away and networks heads will still point to streaming as the only reason they can't pull an audience. Just like cable execs keep citing cord cutting as the only reason for it's collapse, without acknowledging the loss of niche programming and poor content. NBC News Daily is just symptomatic of a larger programming issue. We saw it with the over proliferation of soaps, talk shows, and cable dramas. The bubble burst and the same is likely to happen for news.

Scott Chapin is retiring from voiceover work, for good this time. The end of an era for many Fox affiliates nationwide.

CNBC logo has been Tinkered, bringing along a refresh to the graphics as well. https://variety.com/2023/tv/news/cnbc-ticker-overhaul-screen-graphics-tv-news-1235832629/

Wait. Are you saying that the mockups that you find on this forum aren't worthy of cable news!?

Totally agree. The look is very Sprectrum News. Flat. White. Uninspiring. Not awful but not remarkable. As we know from their tract record, NBC can do better than this. People may object because news is not supposed to be "flashy", but whoever handles graphics and sets for sports networks like FS 1, ESPN, and NBC sports, need to help out network and cable news. CNBC has always been heavily graphics oriented so it can apply.

The Pirates are staying with SportsNet Pittsburgh, and will co-own the network with the Penguins. https://www.msn.com/en-us/sports/mlb/pirates-penguins-to-jointly-own-cable-tv-sports-channel/ar-AA1lsiCI?ocid=msedgntp&cvid=a61a902803924d59bbe9d66d185dea7c&ei=9&fbclid=IwAR1eafXYE1oKJ_FAYxGJcKRSeuFJN7760BjpFbwekDKZrwsTJ_Ie_tqCO1M

Wow, this has to be the biggest departure from WEWS since Ted Henry retired back in 2009. I'll have to catch some of their newscasts in the next few weeks to see how "Scripps-i-fied" they've become. A sad transformation for a station built and put on the air by Scripps to become what it is today.

I’ll say this and then I’ll leave it alone: CBS’ flyover comedies and westerns were top rated shows and executives cancelled them to evolve as a broadcaster. YR may be higher rated than NND, but again… it’s a show CBS has no ownership stake in. I’m willing to bet NND makes more money for NBC than YR does for CBS. They get ad dollars from the news demo (not just injury lawsuits, As Seen on TV, and 65+ Insurance Ads, but consumer products). An article from Variety revealed awhile back that GMA3 commanded more ad dollars than Days in 2021. And that international revenue you speak of means nothing to them because they don’t own or distribute it; they pay a licensing fee to Sony to air it. Which is why I think CBS is done with it(and Bold) in 2024. They get to use that money to pay to bring someone from a competitor to afternoons. Both of those serials are expected to vacate TVC in Hollywood because of the renovations Hackman is currently doing to the studio. CBS likely has no backup plan for assisting in relocation… even moving to Radford(also owned by Hackman) would be costly for them for many reasons(feel free to DM if you want my additional thoughts on it, but I’m not going to bog down an NND thread over soap opera). I also saw Kate and Zinhle(who were on assignment working on a piece on Race in America) doing their thing in LA. I hope they shot some local ads for the NBC LA station there while they were working. Hope all four of them end up traveling for NND at some point. I think the only thing the show lacks(which it doesn’t really need) is a better connection to time and the audience. In the first year, the 2PM EST hour team(yes… the four hours are split between two separate production teams) opened with the time in various parts of the country. Little touches like that (esp. shoutouts to cities in local markets that carry the hour) would help Daily establish that it’s “live(with some repeat segments)” all the time instead of running a traditional news wheel(like CBSN). But not all affiliates get a live broadcast of Daily(including LA), so it wouldn’t be cost-effective.

WJBF Hello Augusta! 1984 promo

We all know, however, the issue is demographics and the bottom line. You can’t spend on a soap in 2023 like you did in 1983 (adjusting for inflation, of course). The audience isn’t there and the ad revenue isn’t there. There may be “many people,” but that isn’t what it once was and isn’t as profitable as it once was. There are theoretically infinite choices available for people who want “escapism.” Corny soaps may work for some, but there are streaming options and satellite channels out the proverbial wazoo offering other options. How Y&R continues to milk the same stories from the 1980s confounds me. My mom was a Y&R and eventually B&B viewer. As her mental state failed in her final days, I’d put on her recordings of them on occasion, not really expecting it to break through the haze of dementia, but maybe something familiar could be comforting on a subconscious level. Dear lord, it was the same people on the same sets telling the same tired stories as when it was on in the college lounges back in the day. It looks stale and cheap to be blunt. There will always be people who resist losing something, and their complaints tend to be disproportionate to the actual viewership. The audience, of course, is the product. And if you don’t deliver the product the client wants…even this non-business major knows that’s a bad business plan. You don’t need the same raw numbers, you need an audience that clients want to buy and pay decent money to do so, while controlling your expenses.

A bit ironic that the story at :44 is about a robbery at…Jacks.

Even if NBCU has such shows in its back catalog (which is highly doubtful), why would the network and its affiliates want to air years, or perhaps decades, old lifestyles, home, or travel shows? Those types of shows can become dated quickly as trends change. But the real issue is that day and date shows are seen as better performers for broadcast. That's why you see news and sports popping up so much. Scripted shows are moving to streaming because they can get real viewership data and people can watch them whenever they want. There's a reason why stations like KTLA and WBTV stay as local as possible. Viewership...and thus ad dollars...are better. Which reminds me of something. Does anyone remember when the late Jim Rogers wanted to take his Intermountain West station KSNV all local outside of NBC network hours? It was 2013 and Rodgers started dumping his syndicated product (Jeopard, Wheel, Judge Judy, Inside Edition, Dr. Phil, and Rachel Ray) in favor of local news. Here is an interesting article from January 2013. It has some very intriguing insights. Jim was about a decade ahead of his time. In regards to adding so many hours of local programming, Jim said, "I want something I can be proud of and, if it’s got to cost me some money,” that’s OK." Unfortunately, he died about 18 months later. The station would ultimately be sold to Sinclair and they immediately started undoing Jim's plan because, as we all know, they are not OK if it's got to come some money.

Much, much better WAFF. -- Matt

WAFF made the switch at noon today! The website has yet to be updated.

So... Old enough to know better, young enough to still get carded at the bar.

This looks extremely similar to the NBC News Now graphics, just flipped, and taller. CNBC NBC News Now I would not suprised if it was done by the same team.

Then the question is what do the ratings look like? If WMTV is #1 (And I'm pretty sure it's between them and WISC?) then "If it broken, don't fix it" might apply. That said, WISC did blow up their graphics and branding a few years back...

While a refresh was somewhat needed, this feels more like a mockup of a design you'd find on this forum than something worthy of cable news. I mean, it's not bad... but... it's not really all that good either? Of course, I'm commenting having only seen just this one screenshot...

WTOG 44 News at 10 1989

Considering the debate's other iffy sponsors...they lucked out big time in getting their logo as visible as it was since the Free Beacon and Rumble were its main sponsors and them, along with Megyn's SXM show, only got bookend mentions. Could have been a lot worse for them.

They clearly find this to be a better way of doing the debrief/anchor toss that used to be exclusively at the anchor desk, which is largely saved for stories that benefit from some anchor-reporter crosstalk. They're never saying that the reporter is actually at the site of the story. Can't help it if a viewer is dumb enough to not understand the difference. It's really not that complicated.

Going to play devil's advocate here. I have seen these type of graphics before. I feel that ABC News was trying to convey that the correspondent was reporting out of the ABC News "New York" bureau/HQ. I don't think it was meant to be misleading.

KDKA 11pm October 1989 They had started using some refreshed harder hitting cuts of the mid 80s KD and You package for the bumpers and close - no more jazzy sax for the close.

This de-affiliation trend of their logos is going to be interesting if it ever reaches the fox affiliates. Especially stations like WALA and WVUE who have branded as "Fox 10 and "Fox 8" for almost a generation. However, this could come in handy in Mobile, especially if they decide to snag NBC away from WPMI after next year and put it on 10.2. It also unifies the branding in markets like Biloxi and Hattiesburg, these are both markets that have dual affiliations but run the same newscast in many time slots. WLOX and WDAM largely refer to themselves by their call letters.

I completely agree. I don't think the "WMTV" brand is strong enough to stand on its own (I'm not even sure that a majority of Madison TV viewers are aware that channel 15 is WMTV, much less call them by that). It's a very different situation than WKOW, for instance, which has used their call letters in their branding for as long as I can remember and has a lot of built-in equity in their local brand. Gray's decision to drop network branding unilaterally, regardless of market conditions, has left me scratching my head. Not to discredit the hard-working staff at WMTV, but I just don't think that their brand can hold its own against NBC in the Madison market.

Lurking for a minute on this post and decided to throw my change in the bucket: I think the moment Kate Snow announced prior to launch that Daily wouldn’t be an “opinion show,” I was on board. It’s very old school CNN Headline News(or OG CBSN with a better budget), something I feel the daypart has desperately needed for about a decade since it opted to slowly phase out of a lineup of serials. I’m one of those “four hours of news” junkies… doesn’t suck for me. It makes the workday go by faster, I catch great health and lifestyle segments, and I’m more curious to research news after hearing their take. I usually autopilot on streaming at work(or WFH) because it’s softer around the desk than music, I like following any real breaking news that comes up(ex. Mitch McConnell’s freezing spells), and they do a good job of keeping it straight with very little fluff. I think entertainment talk shows and even serials are great, but there’s only so much you can do with those in 2023 and in the case of the serial, the networks aren’t making huge profit margins from shows they don’t own. Local stations are seeing a desert of new syndicated options and aren’t willing to pay high licensing fees for anything that can’t sell ads. I agree with whoever said the Daily Team should only be in charge of network special reports during those hours. I’m a CBS News guy, so I usually flip to Norah if Lester Holt pops up on my screen. I have no doubt because of Daily’s success that CW(infrastructure in place thanks to NewsNation and their abundance of local affiliates) and CBS(by shuffling Y&R out of 12/12:30AM if they even keep it past 2024) will want to foray into afternoon news at some point. Let’s hope they’re taking notes from NBC on how to do it right.

Weigel is definitely not an afterthought in the market and they've long left their 90s era struggles at this point. They definitely have the more powerful schedule and good overall lead-ins outside mornings, and they (along with the other four ops in town) hire good people from everywhere rather than MMJs who are hamstrung from the get-go. WTMJ is just in a fugue state where they're still stuck trying to recapture their 90s peak, but with Carole Meekins about to depart they no longer have any of those people in the newsroom and it's mainly either personnel with no connection to the area, or those who came on to try to salvage things, or those who are just there because they sucked up to management still living as if Journal hasn't fully ceased to exist. There's just no encouragement there, or any management that wants it to be unique; their GM did absolutely nothing with WGBA and somehow got promoted, and their 'no comment' in that Next TV article says it all; it's a station that wants to do the bare minimum without Cincy catching onto them.

In retransmission consent squabbles, who is the bad guy the provider (cable, satellite, etc.) or the station group owner? Who's holding out (in this context)?

That would be the goal for CBS, wouldn’t it? To retain as much of the lead-in as necessary. Stations could have the option of airing the hour right after Price, after their expanded hour newscast, or at 2PM/3PM to compete directly against Daily. If the networks aren’t making money for these media companies, that’s exactly what will happen. If programs Daily can make money for broadcast to keep them in the black, then it possibly keeps Comcast from selling the network and the news division. Same for Paramount, who is already flirting with AMG ahead of their big sale(Comics Unleashed/Funny You Should Ask)… I’m a lifelong soap fan… I certainly get why fans don’t want to give up their shows. But we don’t represent the viewership the networks want… we haven’t for over a decade. And spamming the NBC News Daily thread with negative comments, quoting Jamey Giddens (who spent over a decade enabling showrunners’ bad writing and creative decisions under the guise of journalism at Daytime Confidential) and preaching about executives lacking creativity in programming(which is rich given how YR/Bold/Days aren’t even trying and save for the recent Colleen Zenk stunt at YR, are totally on autopilot) isn’t enough of a sell to save the genre in its current state. There are plenty of forums devoted to serials where you can bash network news. It says a lot when the most provocative stories on daytime are being told on NBC News Daily instead of a serial… once lauded as *the place* for relevant social commentary and takeaway for its viewers. If networks are done with serials, give me a hard-ish news show over The View, The Talk, or GMA3 any day of the week.

Website has been changed from NBC15.com to wmtv15news.com. Defiantly rolls off the tongue! In other news, the de-peackockization appears to be complete at Gray after clicking around a bit this morning